Essay

'Write 500 words on how your research has helped you with your pre-production and who your target audience is and why?'


The researches that I have completed to help me come to my final outcome of my pre-production are: my questionnaire and textual analysis. These have had a big impact on the type of pre-production that I came to finally decide to make. As, these were the indicators that helped me to make my final outcome. They were useful because they helped to make my product appeal to a wider and more diverse audience because I tried to use the features that the majority of people who filled out my questionnaire voted for and wanted to see on my CD cover. So as I went with the items with the highest votes it should attract a wider diversity of people, as it is what they answered and what they want to see on a CD cover when they buy one. From my questionnaire I could not only see the features that my target audience most wanted to see on a CD cover but also the factors that they most disliked for certain reasons and did not think were important, or want to see on a CD cover. This was then very useful to me as well because then I could try to work out reasons why they may not like this particular feature and try make sure that my CD cover did not have the certain elements that they did not like, whether it be the main image, fonts, colours, the artists name or even the structure of the CD cover.  My textual analysis has also helped me to come to the final outcome of my pre-production CD cover because as I analyzed different CD covers I saw what other features people put into their CD covers that looked effective and made them unique so I could then try and come up with and include different elements to my CD cover as well. It was also interesting to find out why certain CD covers had specific elements on, as I could then interpret this into my own work and try to make it up to the highest standard possible.  My textual analysis also allowed me to pick out specific elements from the wide range of CD covers that I looked at and analyzed, this then allowed me to be able to pick out the parts that I liked specifically and change them slightly to include into my own work to fit the genre, theme and style of my CD cover.  My target audience is teenagers ages 15-18 and a few of my target audience were up to the age of 41 and slightly over. This is the age range that all of the people who completed my questionnaire were aged between. This age range is also my target audience as this is around the ages that this specific genre of music is aimed towards and that this particular age range listen to, enjoy, and also who the artists themselves aim their music at.

CD cover inspiration Pommez Internacional

CD Cover textual analysis

Main image: In the case  of this CD front cover there is a single image of the singer Shakira. The image is used in a classic way having her posing with flowers coming from her mouth upwards like musical notes. The face is big enough to stand out and to make it obvious to the audience about who's album cover this is. The singer is not making eye contact which then makes this CD cover unique and therefore stand out in a shop against other CD's as normally if the singer is on the front they use direct eye contact to help draw attention. The opposing colours make the CD cover look effect because the main image is black and white and then the flowers are very bright so they contrast one another and give the CD cover a more girly approach, with the flowers, Shakira's hair long and curly and the word 'Shakira' in bright pink.

On this CD cover Adele's image is prominent so this then attracts the audiences attention as they will know that it is her album and therefore attract her fans. In this case there is not just one single image, her man image is the most prominent and then there are 3 smaller images going vertically on the side. So these images are a completely different angle to the main image. She is pulling a natural face in the main image and then the 3 smaller images are of her posing. This could indicate the fact that she is still a normal girl ( the main image) even though she is now famous (the 3 images on the left) as she became famous so quickly. The CD album name is a contrasting colour to the background on which it has been placed so that it is clear to the audience that this is the name of the CD and the names of the songs are slightly smaller so that they do not draw attention from the main image of Adele or the name of the CD.

On this CD cover there is only one main image. The image is used in a very model like way with the girl posing sitting down with her classy outfit, her nails done, her hair all up and her heavy make up. The use of the cross is very effective as it says perfectionist. This implies that the models face is not as perfect as the 'perfectionist' wants so they have crossed it out. It is also very effective because it is red which implies danger. The fact that the CD cover is also outlined in red could imply that she is surrounded by danger.